While a small cohort study indicates that abstaining from direct-to-consumer full-body MRIs could lower the incidence of unnecessary biopsies, federal health officials cautioned Tuesday that the long-term effects of doing absolutely nothing remain severely under-researched.
According to preliminary data published in a recent JAMA paper, individuals who decline to purchase a $2,500 preventative scan at boutique clinics like Prenuvo or Ezra exhibit a nearly 100 percent reduction in incidentalomas—harmless internal anomalies that require months of terrifying follow-up tests to confirm they are nothing. However, experts caution that the data is largely observational, and the long-term psychological impacts of assuming you are fine simply because you feel fine have not been subjected to rigorous double-blind clinical trials.
Medical professionals warn that abruptly adopting a "doing nothing" protocol carries its own poorly understood risk factors.
While the initial findings suggest that abstaining from elective magnetic resonance imaging may decrease the likelihood of undergoing an unnecessary preventative pancreas removal, we simply do not have the longitudinal data to confidently recommend staying home.
The NIH echoed this guidance in a severely caveated press release, noting that while full-body MRIs are heavily associated with severe anxiety spikes and financial depletion, the alternative—living with an unmapped, un-quantified baseline of bodily fluids—could potentially be linked to an unwarranted sense of well-being. The agency stressed that any correlation between not looking for a problem and not having a problem is strictly theoretical and may be heavily influenced by confounding variables, such as the patient actually being healthy.
At press time, the FDA advised consumers to consult with a primary care physician before aggressively doing nothing, emphasizing that more research is needed to determine the exact dosage of ignorance required to safely enjoy a peaceful afternoon.